New CZ-52, observations and questions

[Mad Pick]

Hello, everyone.  I just purchased my first C&R gun, and my first CZ:  A 1953 CZ-52.  Very cool.   

I bought a tin of Romanian 7.62x25, and headed to the range yesterday for the first time.  A few observations and questions:

1) I fired one box (72 rounds) without any failures to feed or eject.  Thumbs up for that!

2) The pistol has an original firing pin, so I'm planning to buy a new, hardened pin.  Any comments on the differences between the pin at Gunpartswarehouse.com ($18.50) and the CZ-52-1 ($30), CZ-52-2 ($45) and CZ-52-3 ($45) from Harrington Products?

3) This thing is a beast to fire . . . it had me kind of intimidated because of the recoil and the fact that I felt like it was slipping around in my hand.  I've ordered a Hogue Handall slip-on grip, so hopefully that will help!

4) I am right-handed.  During firing, my right thumb would push on the safety and after several shots would push it to "Safe" so, obviously, the gun would stop firing.  The safety feels like it's working correctly, with a detent in the "Fire" position.  Is this just "my problem" and I need to work on my grip?  Has anyone else experienced this?

5) I had a number of rounds -- perhaps one per mag -- that did not fire the first time, although the primers were dented.  I know my Romanian ammo probably has rather hard primers, but is there a way to resolve this?  Before firing the gun, I gave it a good cleaning, including the firing pin and channel, so there's no "gunk" in there.  Would a new firing pin help this at all?  Or a new hammer spring?

6) Once when removing an empty mag, and several time when inserting a loaded mag, the slide lock disengaged and the slide snapped closed.  When inserting a freshly-loaded mag, this resulted in a round being chambered.  I notice some slight wear on the slide release and the corresponding area on the slide, but it doesn't look too bad.  I verified that the grip is not touching the slide release.  See the photos:





Any suggestions on how to resolve this?  Is it possible to bend the tab on the slide release outwards slightly, to better engage the slide?

7) I shot 72 rounds, and only saw about 10 empty cases.  I was at an indoor range, so I have no idea how the rest got so far away . . . but this baby was absolutely LAUNCHING them somewhere!  I never did quite figure out which direction, but I had one bounce off my forehead and two of them go down the back of my shirt (ricochet off ceiling?) and make me hop around a bit.     Anyhow, that was interesting!  I was grateful to have my safety glasses!

This is a fascinating pistol.  Thanks for any help you can offer!

[AbyssDncr]

First of all, Welcome to the Party!

Don't know if I have the answers to all your questions, but I have my opinions on a few:

2.  Great to see these are still available, I got mine through Makarov.com years ago and was afraid the pins were no longer available.  My vote is for the -2.  I've used these in two separate 52s and won't have another CZ52 that doesn't get this firing pin.  Single greatest thing I did to make me capable of shooting the gun well, and thereby making it fun to shoot.  Others will disagree as you can read in the stickys, and that's cool - but that's my recommendation. 

3. Handall does help, you'll find that a welcome addition.

4. Yep, I know exactly what you're talking about, and it happens.  I'm kinda tempted to shave my safetly lever down or simply pin it in the fire position.  Your thumb rids it down a bit and it goes into the limbo land between fire and decock, making the trigger pull stiff, if not blocking it altogether.  You'll either have to get used to it, change the part, or change your grip.

5. OLD surplus ammo, it does this.  Best stuff I've found on the surplus market is the Norinco non-corrosive steel cased FMJ in the yellow box.  If you keep firing the Romanian, be sure to read the many writeups on cleaning your gun after shooting corrosive ammo.  I ruined one CZ52 barrel by shooting surplus and cleaning the conventional manner.  I now refuse to shoot surplus through mine because it shoots so dang well, and I don't want to risk any damage to the barrel.

6.  Again this happens sometimes, mines done it on occasion, but it doesn't bother me "too much".  A little touch up of the angles on the slide and slide hold open would fix the issue - if you are comfortable doing such.

7.  Yes it does!  You might want to look into the extra power recoil springs (and mag springs) from Wolff Gunsprings - I think they also have a calibration pack such that you can match springs to different loads.


I would definitely suggest you get one of the -2 or -3 firing pin so that you can dry fire until your heart's content.  Each gun requires it's own little finger finess to get it to shoot well in your hands and I find that dry firing is the best way to figure this out.  From a sand bag, mine has consistently given me sub 2" groups for 5 shots at 25 yds.  Haven't been able to do that with any of my other CZs... 

The recoil springs would also be a strong second.  If you can keep the empties closeby such that you can recover them, pick up a few boxes of S&B brass cased ammo and save the brass for reloading.  It's a fun cartridge to load for!

Best of luck, and don't be a stranger!
 

[Mad Pick]

Thank you very much for the detailed reply, AbyssDncr!  I appreciate that.

4 (hand moving safety):  Thanks for confirming that I'm not alone with this!  I think I'll wait until I get the Hogue grip, and see if that helps.

5 (surplus corrosive ammo):  Yeah, obviously a previous owner shot corrosive ammo (all he had available, no doubt) and didn't clean it properly; there is some light pitting in the barrel.  I shoot corrosive ammo through my AK, though, so I'm comfortable with the cleaning involved.  And . . . unfortunately . . . my local range only allows brass cases.   

6 (slide unlocking):  Thanks, maybe I'll try giving the slide release a tweak.  I guess if worse comes to worse, I can just replace the part.

7 (brass launching and springs):  Thanks for the recommendation on the Wolff springs.  I may just "spring" for a few of those . . . LOL.  I've never heard a bad review of a Wolff spring on any forum, so I guess that says something about their quality and effectiveness.

And . . . 2" groups at 25 yards, eh?  Well, my CZ-52, shooting with two hands, was easily maintaining 12-inch groups at 7 yards.     Of course, that was due to my horrible trigger flinch as I wondered if the safety was on or off . . . and anticipating recoil . . . and wondering if the brass was going to hit me in the head or go down my shirt . . . .     I'll get some of these tweaks made, though, get a few hundred rounds downrange, and see if I can't improve things a bit!  If I can get to the point where I can blame any accuracy issues on the pitted barrel rather than myself, then I'll know that I've accomplished something!

Thank you again for the very helpful reply.

[CZUB]

5) I had a number of rounds -- perhaps one per mag -- that did not fire the first time, although the primers were dented.  I know my Romanian ammo probably has rather hard primers, but is there a way to resolve this?  Before firing the gun, I gave it a good cleaning, including the firing pin and channel, so there's no "gunk" in there.  Would a new firing pin help this at all?  Or a new hammer spring?

6) Once when removing an empty mag, and several time when inserting a loaded mag, the slide lock disengaged and the slide snapped closed.  When inserting a freshly-loaded mag, this resulted in a round being chambered.  I notice some slight wear on the slide release and the corresponding area on the slide, but it doesn't look too bad.  I verified that the grip is not touching the slide release.  See the photos:

I had no issues with accidentally engaging safety or Romy ammo failing to go off but there was a problem with the slide stop releasing after dropping a magazine on one of my 52s. I traced it to the grips coming in contact with the slide release spring. Grips designs were slightly different between my pistols and swapping them cured the problem.

[chaoslodge]

I will ditto all the observations you made about the safety as well as this thing feeling strange to due to the way I have to hold it.  I ordered new grips from marschalgrips.com but I do not know that they will solve that issue.

[witenite0560]

I agree with Abyssdancer, the Handall works great.  I put one on both of my 52s.  I found the trick to be installing them upside down and trimming  to fit.  This put the palm swells in a better spot for me.

[willr]

I have been reluctant to buy any of that old Eastern European ammo.  Some time ago there was a report of dangerous ammo giving far too high pressure -- about 55,000 c.u.p. -- resulting in blown pistols.  I can't find the web site any more which reported it but the cartridge base is reported to have something like the following:

[willr]

I have been reluctant to buy any of that old Eastern European ammo.  Some time ago there was a report of dangerous ammo giving far too high pressure -- about 55,000 c.u.p. -- resulting in blown pistols.  I can't find the web site any more which reported it but the cartridge base is reported to have something like the following:   

                       *
                   3   O   10
                       52

(Cap O is the primer.)

Sorry, the reply got away from me the first time.

willr

[CZUB]

That's Bulgarian. Some users report that it's loaded a bit too hot.

Romanian and Polish surplus function just fine in both of my 52s. I have not heard anything bad about Yugo and Czech ammo though I have no experience with them.

[Hammerspur]

CZUB, I have a full tin + 7.62x25 Tok (Romanian) to be picked up over at my buddy's, haven't yet seen it.
Got a box of 50 rds. with the CZ-52 I bought last week. Case head looks like this:

                       1 6
                        O
                       1 1

Know what that might be?

[CZUB]

Sure it's not flipped?

1 1
 O
9 1

That could be Chinese made in 1991. Anything written on the box?

[Hammerspur]

Sure it's not flipped?

1 1
 O
9 1

That could be Chinese made in 1991. Anything written on the box?

It sure could be me reading it upside down. Came from the dealer I bought the pistol from in a generic gray plastic "Midway" (pre USA) ammo box, not original packaging.

[Mad Pick]

I just wanted to follow up on my original post with some updates.

I bought a -2 Harrington firing pin.  I had to file away quite a bit of my extractor to make it fit, but that didn't seem to be a problem.  One big problem that I did have, though, was getting the new pin installed with its spring.  The ends of the spring were not "finished" in any way -- it just looked like it was a segment cut off of a much longer spring.  When I first installed the pin after I got the extractor modified correctly, I did a bunch of dry-firing to make sure everything was working okay . . . and it was NOT.  After working fine for a bit, the end of the spring became lodged in the hole alongside the firing pin, which jammed the firing pin into place.  Here's a photo; you can see the end of the spring just above the firing pin.



I finally did some bending and tweaking on the spring to get the end of the wire pointing in another direction, and since then it's been fine.  However, it scared me a little because I kept imagining what might have happened if the pin had gotten stuck while firing live ammo . . . .

The new firing pin has been working fine, though it didn't reduce my misfires.  I've chalked those up to the Romanian surplus ammo.

Also, I modified my hold-open catch by bending the tab down, so that the mag will push the catch higher.  I finally concluded that that was my problem, rather than it being an issue between the catch and the slide.  So far, that has been working just fine, with the only downside being that the tab rubs the bullets slightly as they come up in the magazine.  No big deal, though, and I'm not ready to start bending it again.  I also replaced my mag springs with Wolff +10% mag springs, but that didn't make any difference.

I bought a Hogue Handall slip-on grip, and that has helped.  However, I still may pick up a new set of thicker grips because I'm still not 100% happy with the way it feels.

I'm still having trouble with my thumb pushing the gun to "safe" while shooting.  Maybe new grips would help that, too.

I bought a Wolff 16.5 pound "increased power" recoil spring.  This has reduced felt recoil, which is nice.  It also slows the brass down, but they still go pretty far!  I'm tempted to try the 18.5 pound spring.

Still no misfeeds or jams . . . it works like a charm in that regard!

And yes, I'm still a little intimidated by this gun.  I've got a pretty good flinch that has only started to go away . . . might take a few more tins of ammo to cure it!   

Thanks for all of the help that you guys offered.

[Squeaky Duck]

That's Bulgarian. Some users report that it's loaded a bit too hot.

Romanian and Polish surplus function just fine in both of my 52s. I have not heard anything bad about Yugo and Czech ammo though I have no experience with them.

The Bulgarian ammo was intended for the RIFLE, not the pistol.

[skucera]

No, the Bulgarian ammo was intended for all firearms designed to fire 7.62 x 25 Tokarev ammo, including TT-33's, CZ 52's, PPSh submachineguns, and any other models that fired the Soviet version of the Broomstick Mauser pistol round.  I don't know of any "rifles" designed to fire this round, aside from the submachineguns that fire it.  The reason this particular batch of Bulgarian ammo is evil is because the chemistry of its decay during years of storage results in some rounds having much more explosive force than others, and some are so over the designed pressures that they will destroy guns and whoever is standing nearby. 

(Years ago I had some of this 3 * 10 52 ammo mixed into a tin can of surplus Bulgarian ammo I bought, and I foolishly fired one of the rounds to see what would happen.  It made a spectacular fireball in the darkened indoor range, and I realized then that I had done a stupid thing.  I went through the rest of the rounds in that tin, pulled out the ammo with the evil headstamp, and disposed of it.)

Scott